Rob Walker Freer shared his revised memo dated June 9, 1997, "Realignment of General Faculty Council" with Council members. The earlier memo (June 18, 1996) had been instrumental in determining departments/units/offices who employed general faculty that were under represented by the Council. As a result, the 1996/97 elections were held to add the additional Council members that were needed.

In the June 9th memo, Rob evened out the number of departments/units/offices assigned to each GFC representative. He also distributed a list of the names of general faculty in each category, so that each GFC member can directly communicate with their constituents about general faculty issues.

2. Topic: Letter from Peter Low

Doug Hurd sent us each a copy of a draft of proposed revisions to the University Policy on the general faculty, with a cover letter from the Vice President and Provost of the University, Peter Low. Most members had received and reviewed the document and memo, and a discussion about its ramifications ensued.

Rob felt that these documents negated the need to send the letter that Joyce had drafted in May to Leonard Sandridge requesting a meeting to discuss the evaluation and promotion issues for general faculty. It was decided that Doug should respond back immediately to Peter to let him know that we will be looking into the issues that have been raised, make draft revisions and recommendations by late Summer.

Dennis suggested that a task force of 3 GFC members be assigned to assume the leadership of this very important project. The Task Force consists of Doug, Joyce, and Tom. Rob asked that all GFC members send their comments and suggestions to the Task Force for inclusion in our report.

The Council then discussed the recent request by Barbara Henry's office in Human Resources for our definition of who the general faculty were. There seem to be many variations of how general faculty are described at UVa. It was decided that we should stick as closely as possible to the Human Resources definition, as it probably represents the State of Virginia's official designation. Since general faculty seem to be the fastest growing segment of UVa's workforce, it was mentioned that the Council needed to be sure to assign a very strong and forward-looking role and definition to capture its functional diversity.

It was suggested that the Policy Committee conduct a survey of other similar universities to see how they handle general faculty/tenure faculty issues. The AAU DataBank (available through George Stovall's office) is available to provide benchmark information for this task.

Action: Doug will let Peter Low know that we have received his memo and request for input; that it is being reviewed by the Task Force with input from the Council; and that we will draft a response with our concerns and suggestions by late Summer.

5. Next Meeting: July 8, 1997, in Peabody 113, 1:30 P.M. - 3:00 P.M.

Please note room change -- all future meetings will be held in Peabobdy Room 113, not 110 to allow room for the increased GFC membership.